


London Eyes - 00Q

by thirdholmes



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: 00Q - Freeform, Badass Q, Developing Relationship, Fighting, First Kiss, M/M, Protective James, honestly dont underestimate him, mission, not a damsel, shameless flirtation, victorian au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 13:26:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13295835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thirdholmes/pseuds/thirdholmes
Summary: [one shot 00Q Victorian AU]Consequently following the betrayal of a wrongly trusted informant, Bond, Q, and Moneypenny find themselves outnumbered and trapped in an alleyway. Q chooses then to prove himself as more than just their genius, and Bond decides to reveal his long kept feelings.





	London Eyes - 00Q

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not really accustomed to making one shots like this but I really like the Victorian AU concept and I just had to write it. if you like this, please check out my other work in progress, Lionheart! I hope to make it about 20+ chapters, and it's Victorian AU

James Bond had almost convinced himself that the situation wasn’t as entirely out of control as it appeared to be. Icarus Quinn Saoi, better known simply as Q, experienced the vocalization of this denial as they found themselves increasingly surrounded in the wide London alley by individuals whose collective intentions verged on murderous, never mind malevolent.

The dingy brick walls were stained with damp and dirt, the discolouration serving to amplify the aura of uneasiness aided by the solitary gas lamp that stood on the street at the maw of the alley. The sky above them reminded him of a spilled ink well over parchment, great thick darkness spilled over their corner of the world. Disappointingly, the moon had decided to play coward, hovering safely behind clouds as the events unfolded below it.

It was just after nightfall, the commute of carriages slowing considerably at this hour, and Q found himself pressed up against one of the aforementioned walls, his forehead prickling uncomfortably with perspiration and he was positively _itching_ to pull out his handkerchief and remedy this. However, he abstained, choosing instead to pocket his spectacles and subtly wipe his brow with his sleeve in the process.

Their so-called informant, a lady of the night, proved stereotypically traitorous as she led the trio into the alley, promising that it was a shortcut to her employer’s residence. For the past month they had been tracking down an elusive criminal who was the closest thing to a king the London underworld could get, and Celia had assured them that she would be able to lead them to him. As it turned out, the end of the alley they intended to exit out of had been blocked off by a baker’s dozen thuggish looking men, a few sporting crooked noses, all looking rather scruffy and roguish. Six standing where they came in, seven at the other side. The prostitute had kissed Bond on the cheek with a derisive laugh, hiking up her skirt and scampering off down the alley, the men parting for her before advancing in.

Eve Moneypenny and Bond had engaged in the first round of the inevitable fight, the latter shoving Q back into the wall behind him, shielding him bodily as he and Moneypenny had drawn their revolvers from hidden places within their attire. Q knew for a fact that Moneypenny had knives sheathed at her thighs under her skirt- he’d sewn the sheaths and fitted the straps himself- but she hadn’t resorted to drawing them at the moment, even when her gun was knocked from her hand. James had run out of bullets, sending the entirety of his magazine into six of seven men at one end. Moneypenny had hit and taken down three out of the six, blood smears on the brickwork like morbid arrows pointing to the respective bodies crumpled on the ground.

Bond shrugged and flung his emptied gun down, smartly tugging up the sleeves of his coat and balling his fists, cocksure smile unwavering as the hitmen attempted to regroup, dragging their fallen and injured comrades out of the way. Not as a courtesy, more so as to avoid tripping hazards.

“I think this is going rather swimmingly,” Bond mused, watching as the initial thirteen had shrunk down to four men able enough to continue their assault. “Miss Moneypenny, dare I inquire as to what your opinion of our current predicament is?”

“I think that it doesn’t take a genius like our Mister Saoi here to tell you that the bitch has likely gone to fetch even more of these cockroaches,” Moneypenny replied snarkily and far less cordially as she pinned back her dark mane of hair, readying herself for combat as well. She pulled up her skirt to withdraw her twin knives, twirling them lethally, the newly sharpened blades catching in the light. Q had never been more appreciative of the fact that he was not on the receiving end of her anger.

“Right you are.” Bond nodded his head, his handsome grin unwavering. He looked to Q and his jubilous blue eyes took on a nearly imperceptible hint of concern. “Q, you might want to remain behind me, this could get rather messy.”

Q scoffed, feeling irritation build up within him. If the lines of friend and foe hadn’t been definitively set in that moment, he knew he would have struck the man. Due to his own lithe appearance, people undoubtedly gathered the assumption that he was not what would be considered ‘fit’, to be put vaguely, something which came as a great annoyance to him since he did make efforts to be so. With his uncooperative, unkempt dark hair and spectacles, he surely gave of a dictionary image of a boffin, and although it was an accurate description of him, more often than not in came as a hindrance.

_The nerve of him!_

Q had never exactly found himself facing circumstances such as this, those that consisted of violence and copious amounts of danger, but the fact that Bond didn’t see him as an asset, rather a liability, felt like a blow in itself. To hell with masculinity, he was an agent too, just the same as Moneypenny or Bond himself. Despite how incredibly charming he found the man, in that instant he was borderline deplorable.

“I’m not some bloody damsel for you to protect, James.” Q snapped, grabbing the lapels of his coat and shucking off the woolen article, tossing it over a nearby crate.

The intimacy of being addressed by his first name was what brought Bond turning around to watch him, the quartermaster undoing the top button of his shirt and smartly rolling the cuffs up to his elbows. _Vulgar be damned!_ he thought, regardless of the fact that he was showing more skin than one would deem acceptable. At least he hadn’t touched his waistcoat or suspenders. Noticing his colleague staring at him, he furrowed his brow, frowning as he moved to stand beside him.

“What?” Q demanded, meeting his gaze with greater intensity.

“Nothing,” Bond said, but his lips was curling into another one of those brilliantly radiant smirks. “I was just thinking, if a little danger is all it takes to get you taking your clothes off-”

Q flushed, hoping that the pinkness of his cheeks would vanish as quick as breath on a looking glass, his former facade chipped as Bond struck through it per usual. “Not now, Bond.”

The man raised an eyebrow, incorrigible as ever. “Later then? I think after this we’ll all be free tomorrow afternoon.”

“You’re not seriously asking me out-?!” Q surprised himself by only feeling mildly scandalized, a large fraction of himself betraying him in wanting to comply to the request.

Bond barked out a laugh. “Oh, I believe it is rather serious! Besides, this has strangely been the most convenient time to ask, you’ve always been shut up in your workroom-”

Moneypenny took the liberty of enacting Q’s previous fantasy of smacking Bond upside the head. “If you would kindly withhold your flirting for a more appropriate time!”

In their precious moments spent conversing, they hadn’t noticed the four attackers closing in at an untenable speed. Moneypenny ducked in time to dodge a blow, deftly swinging her arms, the blades acting as extensions of herself, tearing through layers of fabric to meet flesh. Q swung blindly behind him with a closed fist, remembering the first time Bond had taught him to fight when their supervisor, Mallory, had not provided any pressing missions for the day. He’d dragged him from his basement office where he’d been decrypting and encrypting coded telegrams the majority of the day and into the cool Autumn air of the courtyard outside of the manor. Q could still remember the smell of smoke from the groundskeeper burning leaves. He’d taken lessons from him nearly the whole month. To think it had been nearly a year ago!

Time had not forgotten, it seemed, as Q struck bone, his particular assailant’s jaw. This only served to stun the man momentarily as he staggered a bit before lunging forward and planting two solid blows into the quartermaster’s chest, one to the face. Pain erupted across his ribs and cheekbone, causing him to gasp. Bond perhaps yelled a belated warning or a shout of anger, but he was detained by his task of fighting two men at the same time. Expectedly, he was doing a laudable job of it.

Q managed to ignore the bursts of discomfort spanning from where he’d been struck and ‘crack on,’ feigning a lunge to the man’s left and instead punching him directly in the throat with his dominant right hand. This elicited a horrendous croaking sound, as if he’d swallowed a bullfrog. His hands flew to his throat as he gasped for air, and Q took advantage of this, punching him in the gut to throw off his balance before kicking his legs out from under him. He could feel the amount of strength he channeled into each strike, the hurt in his knuckles not meaning anything in comparison to what they were doing for him. Another body landed on the ground alongside his adversary’s, Moneypenny’s elegant footwork and wicked blades having done their work.

The man Q had taken down reached a hand out, fingers scrabbling against the cobblestones for Moneypenny’s fallen gun from before which was wedged securely among a stack of bricks.

“I think _not_.” Q scorned, stomping down on the man’s hand with the hard sole of his boot. He began to howl in reaction and Q quickly put an end to the intolerable sound by bouncing into an adequate stance and kicking him in the head. It snapped violently to the side and he was silent and still, unconscious.

Bond had finally beat down one of his two, his lip split and throat red from a failed attempt at strangulation. Heaving a breath, he made to strike, Eve beginning to advance with her knives, but the man sensed the fight against the more experienced agents was going to breed failure, and he wheeled on Q who he decided to be the weak link in the chain.

This must’ve been the strangler, because his large hands locked firmly around his thin neck. Q gagged, struggling for air, caught off guard. He channelled his strength into driving the man ito the opposite wall of the alley, using his hands not to pry the man away from him, but to slam his head into the stone. There was a dull crack, and the hands slackened, their owner dazed. Q pulled free and adjusted his waistcoat with a swift tug before moving back in and delivering two final punches to the nose- breaking it- and the side of the skull- knocking him unconscious.

Like a sandbag’s rope severed, the man fell heavily to the ground, a slow line of blood working its way from his nose, the crimson very visible in the golden glow of the street lamp.

Q stepped back and breathed deeply, running a hand through his sweat slicked hair as he turned back to Bond and Moneypenny, too-long bangs no longer falling across his brow. His entire body buzzed in a most peculiar manner, the pain from the hits he’d sustained completely undetectable against this unfamiliar sensation. He eventually began to realize that this was what was known as an adrenaline rush. His chest rose and fell with each inhale and exhale, unused to the level of exertion.

A flicker of pride kindled as he realized that half of this renewed fight had technically been finished by him.

“How-” Q plucked his handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his face prior to wadding up the square of fabric and tossing it to the side. “- was that for ‘remaining behind you’?”

He directed this quip at Bond, reveling in the surprise that painted his and Moneypenny’s faces.

Moneypenny, however, was not the one that surged forward and kissed Q.

In a few short strides, Bond closed the distance between them and grabbed his waist, firmly pulling Q to him as he slotted their lips together with ease. Without even having to think about it, and at the same time coming to the conclusion that perhaps he thought too much, Q reciprocated, hands sliding between them to grasp the front of Bond’s coat as his mind produced one lucid thought through the fog of ecstasy and bliss that had formed, and he just wanted to _lose_ himself in it.

_James was kissing him._

His eyes sank shut and he could faintly detect the tang of copper from Bond’s cut mingling with that of tea leaves, and he wasn’t quite sure why, but it was there.

And then it wasn’t as Bond pulled away, his breath hot against Q’s cheek, smile audible and seen as the quartermaster opened his eyes once again.

“You did absolutely _admirably_.”

“If it means anything, I agree,” Moneypenny piped in, sheathing her daggers and smoothing her skirt back into place, smiling… proudly? “But I’m not kissing you. No offense, it’s just that you’re already spoken for.”

Q let go of Bond, who swiftly captured his hands in his own, looking over to Moneypenny curiously.

“I presume you’re fine with this?”

“I’m elated.” she replied, picking up his discarded coat and tossing it to him, forcing him to pull his hands free despite not exactly wanting to. “Honestly, I’m appalled that this didn’t occur sooner.”

“Call it bad timing.” Bond said smoothly, lightly kissing Q’s cheek where he expected a bruise to be. A wave of pleasing warmth spread from where his lips touched and Q couldn’t restrain the quicksilver smile that escaped him.

“Speaking of time, we seem to be out of it.” Moneypenny pointed out, gesturing to the far end of the alley where a shadowed group of people seemed to be enclosing at a fast pace. “Ready boys?”

“When you are.” Q answered, shrugging his coat back on. One tug of his hand by Bond and he was sprinting with the two of them out into the London streets, back to whence they came. 


End file.
